He is Obsessed with My Past Mistakes

[iowan]

I'm lost, not sure what to do. I love my husband, but he won't stop thinking and talking about something, and I'm afraid he'll never forgive me.

 

History:

-We started dating when we were very young, I was 17 and he was 18. Ten years later, we're married (have been for 4 years). The problem is that I was immature when we were first together, and it took me some time before I knew what I wanted, or even who I was. When I was about 21, I had doubts about our relationship, and wondered if I still had feelings for the guy I dated before he and I were together. I wondered this in a journal, which he found earlier this year. When he confronted me about it, I didn't know what to say. It was so long ago, in my mind, and it had no relevance or bearing on our current life together. I apologized, and apologized, and we talked about it for months. He asked me if I ever cheated on him. I did not, and told him so. He asked me again. That hurt, deeply, answering that question, but I answered it. I just wanted him to feel ok. The only time we could be close was when we were physically intimate. He would search through my belongings when I was away from the house, and if he found something he didn't understand he would be furious. He would look through photos of us during that time, and would say that our relationship during that time was based on a lie. I never told him about these doubts, and he had no idea. I was afraid he would overreact, so I kept them to myself. I'm glad I did, because they were silly. My conclusion then was that I loved him, and wanted to be with him.

 

Gradually, he stopped asking me about it. I was ready to move on. I have not had doubts like that since that time, when I was so young, and before we were engaged. I understand that he's hurting, and I understand that it's my fault. But I don't understand the intensity of his response. I have never cheated on him, have never thought about it. What he discovered was simply my innermost thoughts, and I didn't have those thoughts to hurt him. Eight months after he found the journal, he tells me that he thinks about it every single day. It's worse when he gets stressed, but it's there no matter what. He wants to go through every object I own with me, to make sure there's nothing else I'm hiding from him that I might have forgotten. Every time I think we have already done that, he thinks of another place where we should look.

 

I do not know what to do here. I've asked him about going to therapy, alone or together, and he is completely against it. Will NOT consider it for a moment. It feels like he wants me to pay for what I did. I don't know how to take it back, and I don't think I should have to pay for this mistake indefinitely. I'm a good wife, I love my husband but this is bordering on emotional abuse. Everything is my fault, everything bad that happens is because I did this horrible thing. How can I move forward? Let him talk about it, or try to wait for it to run its course? How much longer will he be thinking about this every single day? Am I being unreasonable here, expecting him to get over it too soon?

[Furtive]

Ah, I kept reading looking for you to do something wrong...

 

...but you never did anything wrong....

 

...the only person in the wrong is the person reading your personal journal.

 

This is really crazy, I'm sorry you're going through that over something so stupid. I'm going to go on a limb and say this is downright awkward and fanatical behavior on his part. You really need to get him into that therapy session.

 

Good luck though...whatever you decide to do...but know that you did nothing wrong, he did the wrong thing. Yet, you're still trying to figure out how to get him to forgive you? If you can't see that you truly did nothing wrong, period, then you've got bigger fish to fry as you're his for the manhandling.

[DN]

I don't think this is about wanting to make you pay but his saying he feels the relationship is based on a lie is very real to him. Remember that this is still very new and raw to him since it was only recently discovered. He feels that what he thought was a strong foundation for your relationship isn't and he probably fears that if you can have doubts then you could have doubts now. Of course, he should know that you do love him based on your time together but that is asking for rational thought to overcome emotional reaction and that can take time. So don't take this personally, don't expect him to get over it on your timeline and show him that he can trust your love for him. If you start getting angry or impatient with him you will prove that he was right to doubt your feelings for him.

 

Remember that you had been together for four years when you doubted your love for him and wondered about that other guy - this wasn't in the early stages of your relationship.

[Seraphim]

He is being utterly ridiculous and acting like a 3 year old. I can understand he is hurting but it was questioning in a JOURNAL from when you are like TWENTY years old. Obviously you love HIM if you stayed and got married. He sounds really sanctimonious. I would go to counseling on your own. I would also tell him you won't put up with his emotional abuse anymore over anything so ridiculous. Nor should you have to apologize for soul searching in a JOURNAL. I would tell him if he plans on ripping through your stuff routinely and treating you like garbage for soul searching as a 20 year old and he in no way wants to get over this then HE is NOW making your marriage a sham and maybe a separation is in order.

 

I think 8 months on and he is still acting this way, the journal is no longer a newsflash to him and if he does not understand they were the inner working outs of a young mind deciding what they wanted from life he has a few problems of his own that should be explored.

[wheelerdealer]

Yeah i kept scrolling up to re read the first paragraph to find what you did wrong. Im not sure how you having doubts is "wrong." Especially what, 5 or 6 years ago??? It has to be incredibly frustrating to know you never cheated on him yet he says it was a lie back then... Also that he digs through your things. If youve been talking for months about this and hes still doing it, hes probably inventing worst case scenarios in his head that are fueling this obsession and mistrust.

 

Something needs to be done soon or youre just gonna build a deeper and deeper resentment over this. I would say "look, ive been as honest with i can with you and at this point youre not beong fair to me. Lets go to counseling or im done talking about this." I mean what else can you say that hasnt already been said? Youve taken responsibility in a truthful way for stuff thats wayyyyy in the past. Youve gone above and beyond... He needs serious help with trust jealousy and obsessive issues it sounds like.

 

sorry for spelling grammar errors. Im on a phone lol. But best of luck with this..

[DN]

You will achieve nothing by dismissing his feelings. There are very few people who would not be hurt to think that at some point in their relationship their partner was pretending to love them when they were actually having feelings for someone else and feel they were 'settled for' rather than married for the reasons they believed at the time

[Seraphim]

She didn't dismiss his feelings. She told him she was sorry she told him it was long ago mumblings of a young mind. She has asked to work this out in counseling and other ways. HE does not want to. You can not work with someone who does not want to work with you and you can only say sorry so many times before it becomes emotional abuse.

[DN]

Well, this can easily be turned into a war by telling him he's being ridiculous and so on but what will that achieve other than setting the couple on course for further conflict and divorce?

 

It's easy to play "let's you and him fight" but those suggesting that don't have to live with the consequences. My advice is to be more conciliatory, understand why he is hurt and work towards strengthening rather than further undermining a relationship that has been damaged. I think using the term 'emotional abuse' is an exaggeration that helps no one.

[Seraphim]

OP, I would go to counseling on your own if you feel the need to. He can join you if he wishes or not. I still think he has some serious issues that need to be addressed but only he can chose to do that. I would not take his blaming you for every single thing wrong in your marriage and life for very long though because that will erode yourself esteem.

[midnightdeirdre]

I apologized, and apologized, and we talked about it for months.

 

...you had NOTHING to apologize for!!! Your husband was in the wrong to read your journal. Furthermore, the journal was from years ago when you had to do some soul searching. He should've been happy that you chose him after you did that. He owes you an apology, not the other way around.

 

You need to be clear and say to him, "Why did you read that journal? That was personal, you should have asked me first before you even thought of opening it. You really need to get over it and move on, and if not, then I don't know what else you can do. We'll both just stay stuck, especially you."

[sadchick83]

Iowan, Could you possible post what you actually wrote? I am in agreement with the others, I don't think you did anything wrong. You are allowed to have private thoughts, you just transcribed them into a journal.

 

I agree, you have the right to a private diary, but maybe go into a few more details about what you actually wrote.....And how long were you writing about the other guy. I would like to look at things from his perspective. Yes it was wrong for him to read the diary, but what is done is done.

 

How juicy were the contents??

[Miss Firecracker]

I am also wondering what personal things you said about him. Of course I don't expect you will tell all that here.

 

Of course he should never have read a journal without asking permission. That was a huge mistake on his part. And now he will think about this forever. What a can of worms he opened. Don't expect him to just get over it. Could be irreparable damage to this relationship. You had been together FOUR years, so that's pretty serious. I am shocked that you kept that, knowing he could easily end up seeing it.

[DN]

He should not have read the journal - but he did, so blaming him for that isn't going to solve anything.

 

Blaming him for his resulting feelings isn't going to solve anything either.

 

You can take one of two courses here - you can fight with him, which some people seem to want you to do. Or you can attempt to save your marriage which would mean acknowledging his feelings, trying to avoid both of you playing the 'blame game' and working this out in a way that will make both of you happy. This can be accomplished but not by feeding into blame and by escalating this situation into something it need not be.

 

Solving marital problems is rarely accomplished by ratcheting up the emotions.

 

He is angry - and anger is a secondary emotion usually caused by fear. His fear is that he is going to lose you because he never really had you.

[OptomisticGirl]

He's hurt, whether he has a right to or not is irrelavant, it's his feelings and no one can tell him his feelings are wrong.

 

However, him being hurt does not give him the right to poke and prode you every time he suddenly remembers something else. It's like when someone is cheated on: the cheated on person has a right to be angry and mad and all that, and even still be those things if/when they take the cheater back. But at some point, they have to let go of that hurt and anger and actually TRUST their partner again or, otherwise, the relationship will never work out. This is how I see your situation. Your husband has a right to be hurt but after so long, he needs to let that hurt go and start working on rebuilding whatever trust he has lost in you and so forth. To not do so is to wallow in self pity and is very passive aggressive, IMO.

 

As for the counseling front, you may have to get harsh with him. Let him know you realize you hurt him (but never intentionally) but if he persists in continuing to bring this up and go through your things instead of dropping it once and for all and moving forward as a couple, then your going to ask you go to therapy as a couple. If he refuses to go and work on you as a couple, then he has no right to continue to bring up past things.

[Seraphim]

Yup. I agree. He has every right to his own feelings but he should be working in them too, not wallowing in self pity and using them as a weapon every time he is in a bad mood. He needs to decide if he wants to work on his feelings and his marriage and if he doesn't then he should decide whether he wants to be married at all. But punishing your partner over and over for almost year because of a journal is a bit extreme IMO.

[DN]

I hope, iowan, that you will not allow yourself to be goaded into escalating this problem and risking your marriage - unless of course that is what you want. What he should or should not be doing is moot - he isn't the one asking for advice, if he were then the advice would be different.

 

Rather than escalating this, you would be better advised to de-escalate by avoiding blame on both of you, avoiding angry words about who should or should not have done this or that and by avoiding the use of extreme language and attitudes. There are much better ways of resolving this than by being pushed into anger and hasty decisions by people who have nothing to lose.

[OptomisticGirl]

I don't think what he should or should not is moot - he is the one hurt by this. Now yes, the OP needs to do whatever she can buy it will get to the point were she can no longer do the healing - her husband has to take his own healing in his own hands.

[DN]

Moot in the sense that he cannot be directly advised. If he were to post on here he could get advise that would be, mostly, unbiased. But the OP will not be able to deal with him on that level because it won't work. She needs to deal with him in a different way.

[pinkelephant]

In an emotional time, it doesn't matter who is "right" or who is "wrong". It matters how both of you can deal with it. Now, if he is the type to go through your stuff all the time or be untrusting all the time, then my advice would differ but for now, work on soothing his fears and explain them to him without any lies or sugar-coating.

[sunnyhappydays]

He is emotionally abusing you and I can't really understand how anyone can say otherwise.

 

1. He searched through EVERY object you own (including your phone? laptop?)

 

2. He blames you for everything

 

3. He refuses help (he is enjoying the power over you)

 

Solution

 

1. DON'T HAVE KIDS RIGHT NOW. Don't get pregnant until this is sorted out.

 

2. Go to therapy by yourself.

 

3. Tell your husband that this is enough. You've apologized, it's been 8 months so he can forgive you or he can leave. He doesn't get to use you as his emotional punching bag for the rest of your live together.

 

4. Seriously consider if you want to be married to a man like this. He sounds perfectly awful. I would think hard about other red flags that he's exhibited over the years. Is he much older that you? Is he from a poor home or does he have an unstable background? Is he depressed or mentally ill? Is he usually this controlling? Has he ever pushed or threatened you?

 

He sounds like he won't be happy until you spend every day begging for his forgiveness while twisting yourself into little knots trying to atone for your sins and keep the peace. Is that how you want to live your life?

[surgeon]

I HAD to respond to this!

 

The guy has serious issues, you did nothing wrong and by letting him check all of this and all of that all you are doing is enabling the paranoid behavior and it's going to be a nightmare for you.

 

You know what the kicker is? That he refuses counseling.

 

That tells you right there he's getting off on this. Yes you should fight him on this and not play along in an attempt to "save your great marriage".

[lavenderdove]

OK, there are several separate issues here.

 

First, he is hurt. Of course he is hurt, anyone would be finding out that someone had doubts about the relationship.

 

However, that was ELEVEN years ago and you've shown him your love by marrying him and staying with him. And frankly, i can hardly even remember the names of a couple guys i dated a long time ago, let alone remember why i even liked them at the time. He is way overreacting to this as if it were a CURRENT threat to the marriage, when frankly his behavior and reaction to this is now more of a threat to the marriage than something that happened 10 years ago.

 

So he has some insecurity issues, and also some misperception issues in that he feels he has the right to 'police' your thoughts and go thru everything you own in some sort of attempt to make himself feel more in control. But making you do it with him has an almost inappropriate 'parental' feel to it, like he's dragging you thru the mud and enforcing that you were a 'bad girl' over and over and must be controlled and watched because of that, which is frankly wrong.

 

How do you handle this? You've already apologized to him and that part is good. But you shouldn't acknowledge/give in to his continued policing behavior 8 months after the fact. If he comes to you again wanting 'us' to go thru something, just say, 'fine, knock yourself out, rake thru anything you please but i'm not going to waste my time raking thru my sock drawer over an event that happened 10 years ago and has no meaning to our current life together, and if you feel better, go ahead, waste your day digging thru my sock drawer.' Let him know that his behavior now is getting to be boring and ridiculous, but if he feels better doing it, go ahead, but you don't have to play the game of letting him put you in purgatory every time he has another bad moment, so you won't sick around with him while he digs around in your closet. He's not your father, and certainly if you are doing nothing wrong now, you shouldn't have to waste your days catering to his insecurities and these little fire drills of him riffling thru your stuff.

 

So every time he wants to go thru your sock drawer, just act bored and say, 'knock yourself out', but don't participate. If he's doing it to 'punish' you he will stop because you aren't agreeing to stand around and be punished anymore, in fact, you're showing him his 'punishing' isn't working. If he's not trying to punish you and is just dealing with insecurity, eventually he'll get bored with riffling thru your sock drawer on his own and will stop. But don't agree to do it with him or accompany him while he does it.

 

If he tries to engage you in endless talks about it, then just use a technique they call 'broken record'... Just listen to him for no more than a few minutes, then stop him and say, you know we've discussed this many times and there is nothing left to say and this has no relevance to your life together now and is old history. If you want to continue to rehash this, then we must go to a marriage counselor to talk about this, otherwise there's no point to continuing to rehash the same thing and just cause more friction when it is not relevant to our current life.' Then leave the room. Just keep repeating the same speech until he gets the idea that after 8 months, he needs to either adjust to this and forget about it, or you need to go to counseling because this has touched some kind of deep seated insecurity in him that needs to be addressed by a professional because rehashing the same old thing and rifling thru your things like you're a convict on probation only adds stress to the marriage and doesn't solve anything. It certainly doesn't change the past, and he needs to recognize there IS a difference between something that happened 10 years ago, and something that is currently relevant to your lives together.

 

So don't fight about it, just don't play! If he wants to continue to play with this after 8 months of punishing/fearful behavior, then it is time of a marriage counselor and you just need to keep reinforcing that if he keeps bringing it up. And if he won't agree to that, then don't agree to rehash or participate in his little search and seizure attempts.

[zelder]

Iowan - I second the advice given by DN. It's really good advice. He's a wise man.

 

You'll get through this, your husband will eventually come to his senses and overcome the irrational emotional reaction he is having.

[Tarnation Joe]

While his feelings are not 100% foreign to me, they are 100% inappropriate. He is taking a short-cut to avoid trusting you and respecting you. You have to nip this in the bud. My wife and I got together when she was young and after 13 years of marriage we still haven't entirely re-set the stamp on the unbalance we had at the beginning. It takes work, but the more you put it off, the more work it takes.

 

It won't be easy for him to back down without him feeling incredibly threatened. Not because of what you wrote, but because of where he is with it now. But there is no other option. He has to back down. Tell him to take the risk, and he'll find it not a risk at all.

[dobbin]

there is only so many times you can say sorry. thing is you are entitled to your thoughts. it's not you actually cheated on him

if he cannot forgive you for something in the past and sneaked around into your things without your knowledge, it says alot about his character

do you really want to be with someone who is insecure, does not trust you and cannot forgive you?

we all make mistakes in the past and we will continue to do so in the future

find someone who will and can forgive you. leave the insecure untrusting obsessive unforgiving guys alone